Rudolf Rechberger

Rudolf Rechberger (born June 1, 1905 in Upper Austria ; † unknown) is an Austrian who fell victim to a miscarriage of justice in the post-war period . According to Otto Tschadek, the Rechberger case was one of four cases of miscarriage of justice (alongside the Franz Thiel , Alois Manninger and Wilhelm Gratzl cases ), which shook "confidence ... in [Austrian] jurisprudence " in the post-war period and to prevent reintroduction contributed to the death penalty in Austria.

Life

In the 1920s Rechberger fathered the child Rudolf with the sixteen year old Anna. Anna filed for divorce in 1925 but returned to him after three months.

As she was ambitious in contrast to him, she got a diploma as a household teacher in 1938 and in 1945 even became a councilor in Lenzig , while he only got it as a foreman. When her son Rudolf was killed on the Eastern Front in 1944 , she reproached her husband for having driven him to his death through his lack of love. In 1947 she was hospitalized for sleeping pills and claimed that her husband had tried to poison her with eight veronal tablets .

In the following years Rudolf Rechberger lived in the house of the factory worker Gattenmayr. On October 20, 1951, he was sentenced to 18 years in prison in Wels for having poisoned the five-month-old Sieglinde Gattermayr (daughter of Gattenmayr with an Afro-American GI ) with thallium in 1949 ; his divorced wife Anna Rechberger had reported him. "When the verdict was announced, he grabbed the crucifix from the judge's table and tearfully protested his innocence."

Thanks to "miscarriage of justice" Gustaf Adolf Neumann , the miscarriage of justice was uncovered. "In the summer of 1958 he got from the 82-year-old farmer Rechberger an appeal letter, he should accept her for seven years innocent sitting in prison Son." In Rechberger's then defense Dr. He inquired Nordmeyer, and learned that the jury had only "a majority of one vote to the guilty verdict" ; in the event of a tie, there would have been an acquittal.

Neumann got in touch with the defender's attorney. At the time, he had a horoscope drawn up and was convinced that he was defending a murderer. Neumann studied the files and that means with him that he tapped off every object that is mentioned in them.

For example, there was a bag of “Muscid”, the rat poison that Rechberger is said to have used. Neumann asked for “Muscid”, but wherever he auditioned, he was offered “Zelio” everywhere, and not in a bag either. The speaking object was found.

There are “Muscid” in sachets. But this little common rat killer does not contain thallium , but zinc sulfate . Thallium, as it is contained in “Zelio”, was found in the body of the murdered child. That was the "new fact". After seven years, Rechberger was released from prison. 176,000 schillings in compensation (28,000 marks). There was no new negotiation.

In 1957 the procedure was resumed, in which errors in the expert report by Dr. Schwarzacher and Jantsch were discovered. Rechberger was then released.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} "Urgent request regarding the prevention of judicial errors (PDF; 1.8 MB) by MPs Franz Olah , (Otto?) Kranzlmayr, (Rudolf?) Marchner and comrades to the Federal Minister of Justice,". National Council VIII GP. 54th session, March 5, 1958. Shorthand transcript. Page 2474–2484.
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Hans Martin Sutermeister . Summa Iniuria: A Pitaval of Errors of Justice . Part 5: Uncritical evaluation of the testimony. Basel: Elfenau, 1976. pp. 335-337.
3. ↑ Gerhard Mauz : Guilty because we have no one else . In: Der Spiegel . No. 18 , 1965, p. 116 ( online - April 28, 1965 , article about the misjudgment hunters Hans Martin Sutermeister and Gustav Adolf Neumann).